Game details

If you don’t pay attention to the world of modern board games, you’ve almost certainly never heard of Scythe. If you’re a diehard cardboard fan, though, it’s all you’ve been hearing about for months.

Scythe is arguably the most-hyped board game of 2016, and it’s certainly one of the biggest (Rob Daviau's upcoming Seafall is another contender). Scythe's Kickstarter campaign was a massive success, raising more than $1.8 million from 18,000 backers (disclosure: I backed the game at the $79 “Premium Edition” level). The game is making its official retail release at Gen Con next weekend, so you should be able to find a copy at your local game store or favorite online retailer soon.

No matter how you slice it, the game is a big deal. If you care about board gaming in 2016, you should know about Scythe. But its massive hype also brings with it the crushing weight of huge expectations from thousands of people who plunked down upwards of $100 (or more) for a single game. Add to that the cross-armed naysayers standing on the sidelines, ready to tear the game apart if it isn't something truly special.

Now that the thing is on the tables of Kickstarter backers across the world, is it worth all the bluster?

Mind your back

What everyone came for: the minis. Each faction has its own mech sculpt...

And its own leader...

And even a unique set of worker meeples. Adorable hats come standard.

Each faction also gets a whole mess of wooden tokens to play with.

The player board is where the action happens. Each turn, you'll pick one of the four action spaces, which allow you to move around the board, produce resources, and beef up your army.

The Kickstarter edition I got came with these fancy metal coins. Once you go metal, it's hard to go back to cardboard.

The side of the box includes a diagram that shows you how to fit everything back in. I kinda followed it.

Scythe is a competitive game for one to five players that takes place in an alternate history “dieselpunk” 1920s Europe. An uneasy peace has settled over five once-warring nations, but things are heating up again after the closure of The Factory, a capitalistic city-state whose mysterious technologies are now up for grabs. Peace, it seems, wasn’t meant to be—it’s time to suit up in giant mechs, send your workers into the fields and mountains, and prepare to take control over the land of Eastern Europa once more.

Before we talk about the game itself, let’s talk components. There are a lot of them, they’re absolutely gorgeous, and they're all tied together through the stunning art of Jakub Rozalski. I’ll admit that I backed the Kickstarter based largely on the quality of the components (and, of course, the strength of Stegmaier’s previous designs Euphoria and Viticulture). I don’t think I was alone.

Walk by a group of people playing Scythe and you’ll see a gargantuan board, tons of plastic miniatures, countless wooden meeples and tokens, stacks and stacks of cards, two player boards per player, and plenty of other cardboard miscellany. (Kickstarter bonuses pile on more bling, including metal coins and resin resource tokens. The game’s board can be made even bigger with the Collector’s Edition board expansion piece; if you have a table the size of a small country, knock yourself out.) Be careful hefting the box onto the table—the damn thing weighs about 10 pounds.

Enlarge/ The game's five factions—Rusviet, Crimea, Nordic, Polania, and Saxony.

“OK,” you might say as you survey the game, “I get it—it’s a wargame.” Plastic miniatures depicting mechs and warlike generals placed strategically on hexes, empires expanding across the board in a bid to conquer everyone and everything in their paths—the game looks like the sort of "dudes on a map" combat title that board game fans are familiar with.

But you’d be wrong. Scythe is more a game about the threat of war, or at least of violence, than all-out carnage. It has elements of a 4X game, but it’s really more of a 2.5X game (there’s no real “exploration,” and the goal is not to completely exterminate your foes). You'll be farming the land for resources, building stuff with those resources, and just generally trying to make your mark on the board.

It’s an area control game. It’s a resource management game. But over everything, Scythe is a puzzle—and it's a very good one.

Each player starts with six wooden stars that they’ll place on the central board by completing certain goals. For example, you can build four mechs throughout the game. When you’ve built all four, you put a star on the board. Get all your workers on the board—that’s another star. Win a combat, get a star. There are nine ways to put stars on the board, and when someone places his or her final star, the game ends immediately. As in all good capitalist games, money equals points; whoever has the most money at the end of the game wins.

You’ll get some money through general play, but a big chunk of your fortune comes at the end of the game. And most of it will come from the stars you’ve placed on the board, the hexes you control, and the resources you’ve produced.

Through it all, you’ll need to keep an eye on your “popularity,” which represents how the people of Eastern Europa view your faction. In game terms, popularity acts as a score multiplier—the higher you are on the popularity track, the more points you’ll get for your stars, hexes, and resources. But boy, can you get some cool bonuses by being a jerk.

It's a lot to take in at first, and there are a multitude of things you need to keep in mind in order to do well. But in a game with so many complex, interlocking parts, it’s striking how simply the turn structure works. Everything that happens on the main board—every decision that you make in the game—begins with your strategic HQ, the personal player board.

Build your engine

Each player board has four spaces. Each space has two actions on it—one on the top and one on the bottom. On your turn, you put a wooden pawn on one of the four spaces, and then you do the top action, the bottom action, or both. And since you have to move your pawn to a new space each turn, practically the entire game consists of you choosing between three action spaces. That's it.

But “simple” doesn’t mean easy.

Doing top-row actions is pretty straightforward. You pay the cost indicated in any red boxes and get the benefit shown in any green boxes. One action lets you move some of your units around the board, another lets you trade a coin for resources, another lets you produce resources yourself, and another lets you boost your combat power. But the bottom row actions are a bit trickier. These actions cost you some of the game's four main resources—wood, metal, oil, and food—and let you bolster your faction by building things like mechs and buildings. One bottom row action even lets you “upgrade” your player board, reducing the costs and increasing the rewards of doing actions.

The trick is figuring out how to do both the top- and bottom-row actions on your turn, which requires you to think two or three (or even more) turns ahead. Scythe is a game about efficiency, and your player board is essentially an efficiency puzzle with results that play out on the main board. If you can plan ahead and consistently do two actions per turn while your opponents do only one, you will have a massive advantage. But making that happen is way harder than it sounds.

Each hex on the board is home to a certain resource, and you'll be able to produce on a hex as long as you have a worker there. But the resources go directly onto the board when produced, and you only control the resources when you control the space. Setting up your workers on the right spaces to produce the right resources is essential, and you'll twist your brain in knots trying to get everything to align perfectly.

My tabletop group has really enjoyed the mechanics of this game, which feel very solid, but lead to unpredictable outcomes. Our main gripe, unmentioned in the review, is that the random draws are very unbalanced, and there aren't enough of them to balance out. Some factions (red) are way better than others (white), and since any faction will only see two or three encounter cards during the game, their unbalanced randomness feels unfair instead of fun. Overall, however, we would not hesitate to recommend Scythe to any gaming group.

Sometimes when I read reviews like this, I wish I had game nerd powers. Looks so cool. But I know I'd end up frustated.

I've played Pandemic and it's truly a cool game but even that took my better half and I a whole weekend to get the hang of it. This game though and others like it? It's clearly a couple levels more complex / advanced than Pandemic or more commercial titles like Game of Thrones...... and even THAT game is intmidating to get started.

So yeah. I need nerd powers because this looks fun. But I know it would own me. Because I don't have nerd powers. My nerd powers, they're in the veil of shadows.

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

My tabletop group has really enjoyed the mechanics of this game, which feel very solid, but lead to unpredictable outcomes. Our main gripe, unmentioned in the review, is that the random draws are very unbalanced, and there aren't enough of them to balance out. Some factions (red) are way better than others (white), and since any faction will only see two or three encounter cards during the game, their unbalanced randomness feels unfair instead of fun. Overall, however, we would not hesitate to recommend Scythe to any gaming group.

If you're talking about the faction/player board combos, I did mention that some feel more powerful than others. If you're stuck on a starting zone with no metal and your mechs are cheap, you can't spam mechs first thing in the game. But then maybe you find another way off the island quickly, like building a tunnel. I feel like a lot of the game is about adapting to what you're dealt (a theme I see carried over from Viticulture).

As for the factions alone, red is powerful, but as white, you can focus on zipping around the board and picking up encounters, which can be lucrative. I think it will take a while for players to figure out how to optimize their starting kit with their faction abilities, so I hesitate to call the abilities unbalanced. The game did go through extensive playtesting.

Worth noting, though, that there's always a bit of randomness in Stegmaier's designs. I'd say this one has the least, but this isn't Terra Mystica.

I backed this as well, and can confirm the exquisite level of craftsmanship that went into Scythe was well worth every penny. I especially love how each faction is unique, but perfectly crafted to work with their starting locations on the board. A fabulous work of art, and very playable, once you grasp the ruleset.

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

I've found much the opposite in practice. There are more over-60s than under-30s in the board gaming community around here. The young'uns are all playing Call of Duty on Xbox Live or whatever else those whippersnappers are up to these days. The olds are used to classic Avalon Hill titles and were playing ten hour games of Civilization back in 1981.

Anyhow, I'm looking forward to trying Scythe. (I had the chance last weekend but the other interested players and I didn't sync the ends of our previous games very well.) Thanks for the review, Aaron!

Sometimes when I read reviews like this, I wish I had game nerd powers. Looks so cool. But I know I'd end up frustated.

I've played Pandemic and it's truly a cool game but even that took my better half and I a whole weekend to get the hang of it. This game though and others like it? It's clearly a couple levels more complex / advanced than Pandemic or more commercial titles like Game of Thrones...... and even THAT game is intmidating to get started.

So yeah. I need nerd powers because this looks fun. But I know it would own me. Because I don't have nerd powers. My nerd powers, they're in the veil of shadows.

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

Almost anyone can work their way up to a game of Scythe-level complexity, no real nerd powers required, just time and interest. Start with easier stuff - Catan, Splendor. You'll know when you're ready to move up to the likes of Puerto Rico and Agricola. You begin to recognize the similar mechanics - much like once you've learned 2 programming languages picking up a 3rd is much easier.

Totally a function of experience, not age. One of my game groups is half retired people.

Sometimes when I read reviews like this, I wish I had game nerd powers. Looks so cool. But I know I'd end up frustated.

I've played Pandemic and it's truly a cool game but even that took my better half and I a whole weekend to get the hang of it. This game though and others like it? It's clearly a couple levels more complex / advanced than Pandemic or more commercial titles like Game of Thrones...... and even THAT game is intmidating to get started.

So yeah. I need nerd powers because this looks fun. But I know it would own me. Because I don't have nerd powers. My nerd powers, they're in the veil of shadows.

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

Grew up playing Avalon Hill war board games in the 70's and these were mostly long and complicated with hundreds of unit counters. Google a few if you doubt, young padawan....

I want a war-bear. It's times like these that make me really wish I had a decent group to game with.

This game supports single player out of the box! It has a special solitaire deck included to replicate what opposing players would do.

Game complexity-wise, from watching the YouTube videos, this game would probably be a bit easy for the Avalon Hill crowd. As the article mentions, despite the armored mech figures and the hex map, there's not really a lot of combat. But slots right into the Puerto Rico/Agricola/Mare Nostrum level of eurogames.

I love the idea of printing a packing guide diagram on the side of the box (especially on the outer face of the inner box-half, which is hidden on the shelf and thus near-useless for advertising anyway)

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

Maybe that's true. I'm 37, and while it takes time and effort to read and understand the mechanics (and then more top to develop strategies), it's like anything else. Time invested and meaningful practice.

I only began playing modern board games a little under two years ago. I played with more experienced gamers, and a guy with a computer for a brain, so it was intimidating, and I usually did not win. But I enjoyed the challenge anyway. In addition, we worked our way up to more complex games (a credit to the friends/co-workers that introduced us.)

Start with Ticket To Ride, Carcassonne, Sushi Go. If you enjoy those, then try Lords of Waterdeep, 7 Wonders, maybe give Pandemic another go. Don't let the theme overwhelm you. Pandwmic is hard to win, but not necessarily to play. Your only objective is to collect five cards of the same color, and move to where you turn them in. Everything else, which in this case is moving to cities to reduce the spreading disease, is ancillary. You'll probably lose, but you shouldn't get hung up on that.

If you progress from there, to games like Viticulture, Kingsburg, Seasons, they won't seem as intense once you've seen the various common mechanics in more isolated form.

Forgive the off-topic gratitude, but just came by to thank the Ars gamers for a recommendation in another forum. Someone turned me on to the amazing Dvonn. My wife and I love it so much, I went out and bought Gipf, Zertz, Punct, and Yinsh. We are just getting into Gipf now. Awesome.Thank you again, everyone.

I've found much the opposite in practice. There are more over-60s than under-30s in the board gaming community around here. The young'uns are all playing Call of Duty on Xbox Live or whatever else those whippersnappers are up to these days. The olds are used to classic Avalon Hill titles and were playing ten hour games of Civilization back in 1981.

Anyhow, I'm looking forward to trying Scythe. (I had the chance last weekend but the other interested players and I didn't sync the ends of our previous games very well.) Thanks for the review, Aaron!

I guess I should clarify. I don't mean to suggest most of the younger set are playing these board games more so than XBone or Playstation — obviously it's a console generation by far. Just that the people I do know that love these games like Magic and War Hammer and more intricate stuff like this game, they're all like 25-35 seems like. Could just be in my local area. It would be interesting though, to see how many started out as kids, playing D&D or something close.

I guess I should clarify. I don't mean to suggest most of the younger set are playing these board games more so than XBone or Playstation — obviously it's a console generation by far. Just that the people I do know that love these games like Magic and War Hammer and more intricate stuff like this game, they're all like 25-35 seems like. Could just be in my local area. It would be interesting though, to see how many started out as kids, playing D&D or something close.

Out of curiosity, do you mind sharing your age? Just curious if you're observation is more because you're mostly around people under the age of 38. I'm almost 40, and I love games like this and never played D&D as a kid.

One factor you're probably not thinking of, though, is that other people around my age very often have kids, and thus games like this get moved to the backburner for a good 14-15 years before we have time to sit down and immerse ourselves in one again. That's partially because we can't set up games like this without asking for trouble (young kids see all the game parts and immediately want to grab everything) and also partially because we have very little free time anymore to get together with a dedicated group for hours on end to play games like this.

I never get to play these games anymore for the reasons above, but also because while I enjoy board games, I have other passions that I prioritize higher during the few bits of free time I get now and again.

Out of curiosity, do you mind sharing your age? Just curious if you're observation is more because you're mostly around people under the age of 38. I'm almost 40, and I love games like this and never played D&D as a kid.

One factor you're probably not thinking of, though, is that other people around my age very often have kids, and thus games like this get moved to the backburner for a good 14-15 years before we have time to sit down and immerse ourselves in one again. That's partially because we can't set up games like this without asking for trouble (young kids see all the game parts and immediately want to grab everything) and also partially because we have very little free time anymore to get together with a dedicated group for hours on end to play games like this.

I never get to play these games anymore for the reasons above, but also because while I enjoy board games, I have other passions that I prioritize higher during the few bits of free time I get now and again.

The kids observation is a very good one. And in fact off the top of my head the people I was thinking of, do not / did not have kids at the time I was discussing the games with them. As for me, the wrong side of 40, unfortunately.

So as I read this, I have to wonder if ArsTechnica will be at GenCon next week. The more you post about board games like these, the more I think we need an article about all the board games at what is a massive board game conference, if not the largest.

So as I read this, I have to wonder if ArsTechnica will be at GenCon next week. The more you post about board games like these, the more I think we need an article about all the board games at what is a massive board game conference, if not the largest.

I have this theory that anyone over the age of about... mmmm... 38?.... has problems with these super-intricate games because they didn't grow up playing complex / role playing type games. Unless you were a D&D nerd back in the 80s. That's the lone exception.

Scythe is quite a step down from what my friends and I (now in our 40s) used to play on weekends when we were in our 20s and 30s and less encumbered. Games like Axis and Allies and Twilight Imperium are considerably more complicated and fiddly than Scythe.

The game UI is a lot closer to a tablet/phone game where the choices are in front of you. Maybe explains why my fourth grader picked it up so quick.

Scythe is quite a step down from what my friends and I (now in our 40s) used to play on weekends when we were in our 20s and 30s and less encumbered. Games like Axis and Allies and Twilight Imperium are considerably more complicated and fiddly than Scythe.

The game UI is a lot closer to a tablet/phone game where the choices are in front of you. Maybe explains why my fourth grader picked it up so quick.

I hate to disagree but Axis and Allies? That was a very streamlined mechanic with a simple economic model. It was overly balanced and very simple to play. Sure it can take a long time to finish but that's just duration not complication.

Twilight Imperium is more complicated (with the semi-random board it and robust rule variations) but overall not in my top tier of complicated games. Sure the first edition could go on for way too long but it was actually fun with the game politics that seemed to pop up with every game.

I am very much regretting not backing this on KS when I had the opportunity.

The artwork looks to be spectacular and dripping with thematic elements. I would not have really expected Fantasy Flight-quality out of a KS (had some very middling experiences like Tesla V. Edison) but this looks just outstanding.

I was all set to pull the trigger on Star Wars: Rebellion for my new Big Assed Game fix and now I am quite torn.